Ammunition



1931- c. A. BURGHARDT 1,834,378

AMMUNITION Filed April 11, 1930 INVENTOR. Clair A.Bu1'3lw rdt BY QZQ W AT EYsj ll atented Dec... a, tear nanr snares MEETS, T AMERICAN i: .1

a OBATION OE DWARE Application filed April 11,

The present invention pertains to wads for shot shell ammunition and to materials for such--wads. In my Patent No. 1,724,338 for ammunition, dated August 13, 1929, there is disclosed an improved shot shell wad formed vantages over wads used theretofore.

- of the Wad through the bore.

The wad material disclosed in said patent is formed by arranging hair preferably on both sides of the fabric center and passing portions of the hair through-the center by the action of suitable punching needles. These needles are of steel and rather slender, and there is present the possibility that some of these needles may be broken during the operation of punching and become embedded in the wad material. The presence of such sharp pointed bits of steel in shot shell wads is undesirable in view of the possibility that these bits of steel might scratch and injure the surface of the gun bore during passage It is, of course, possible to sort out any wads containing broken punching needles before loading the wads into shot shells, but this entails added effort and expense, the elimination of which is obviously desirable.

The present invention contemplates the provision of a material for shot shell wads made of short hair fibres felted to a fabric center and possessing the advantages of the wad material disclosed in the above-mentioned patent, and at the same time being entirely free of the possible presence of broken punching needles in such wads.

These and further objects are obtained by making wad material according to the present inventiomas will be apparent from the following specification of which the accompanying drawings form a part.

' llnthe drawings:

arn areas '1 A. JBURGHARDT, OF BEDGRORT, CONNECTICUT, ASSIGNQ BY MENE ASSIGN- & FELT COMP, OF 'CHIGAGO,- ELHTOIS, A

1930. Serial no. 448,262.

Figure 2 is a similar view in elevation,

partly in section, of a shot shell embodying a somewhat different arrangement of wads made according to the present invention.

Figure 3 is an enlarged detail view, in section, of wad material made according to the co present invention.

Like the wad material of the above-mentioned patent, the wad material contemplated by thepresent invention is formed of a felt of short hair fibres secured to a coarsely d5 Woven fabric center by having portions of the hair passed through this fabric center. Referring to the drawings, the felt of short hair making up the body of the wad is shown at 10 (Figure 3) arranged on both sides of a fabric center 11. The present invention, however, comprises the discovery that wads formed by felting a body of short hairs to the fabric center by vibrating methods, instead of needle punching, is entirely satisfactory for shot shell purposes, and that wads so made are not open to the objectionable possibility of containing broken bits of punching needles.

The wad material of the present invention may be made, for example, by arranging a quantity of short hairs preferably both above and below a fabric center placed on a platform or rack, and then subjecting said rack to a rapid vibration. Thisvibration causes portions of the hair to work its way through the fabric center, while at the same time causing an inter-weaving of the hair, and further causing a substantial portion of the hair to arrange itself in a general direction normal to the surfaces of the wad material, rather than parallel to these surfaces. Wads made from the material thus formed are found to be sufiiciently rigid to prevent their being torn apart by ordinary handling, and

to be quite compressible axially and expansible radially under axial compression to form a highly efiicient gas check in the bore of a gun. The rigidity and elasticity of the' wad material may be readily controlled by mo mixing with the hair various amounts of size and subjecting the material to various pressures. The thickness of the material may be controlled by varying the amount of 5 hair used and by applying various pressures.

Furthermore, the wads of the present invention may be made of such strength and rigidity that the; customary over powder wad, illustrated at 12 in Figure 1, formed of cardboard or other comparatively hard material, may be omitted, and the hair felt wad of the present invention substituted, as

' indicated at 13 in Figure 2. 1

It is desirable in loading shot shells of resent day manufacture to insert the wads 1n the shell by a form of punching tool which serves to cup the wads slightly, as indicated at 14 in Figures 1 and 2. This serves to hold the wads tightly in their assigned positions 2 in the shot shell, due to the lateral resiliency afforded by the wad material of the present invention assisted by the lateral spring action afforded by the cupping, and a tight gas check in the gun bore is thus afforded. The

benefits of these expedients are greatly-enhanced by wads made from the material of the present invention. I

It will be understood that the term fabric center in the specification and claims refers to a fabric reinforcing means for the wad material which need-not necessarily be positioned at the exact center of the material, but may occupy positions at various distances from the center without material- 5 1y altering its intended function as a reinforcing means. Such'variations, as well as other immaterial changes, are contemplated as falling within the scope of the invention as defined in the following claims.

40 What I claim is:

1. A wad for shot shells comprising a woven fabric center, a felt of short hair secured to said center by vibration, whereby a. portion of said hair passes transversely through the fabric and a substantial portion of said hair is arranged to extend 'substantially axially of the wad.

2. The method of producing wads for shot shells which comprises vibrating'short hair fibres on a textile fabric to cause a substantial portion of said fibres to pass transversely through said fabric and cutting wads" from the resulting material in such manner that the fibres extend axially of such wads.

A CLAIR A. BURGHARDT. 

